A federal judge on Aug. 31 sentenced Proud Boys leader Joseph Randall Biggs to 17 years in prison and co-defendant Zachary Rehl to 15 years, calling the destruction of a fence on U.S. Capitol property during the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol breach an act of terrorism.
Mr. Biggs, 39, of Ormond Beach, Florida, is the first of the Proud Boys leaders to be sentenced after being found guilty in May of seditious conspiracy and five other Jan. 6-related charges.
His is the second-longest sentence meted out in a Jan. 6 case, falling just short of the 18 years given in May to Oath Keepers founder Elmer Stewart Rhodes III.
Mr. Biggs’s other convictions were for conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of an official proceeding, conspiracy to use force, intimidation or threats to prevent officers of the United States from discharging their duties, interference with law enforcement during civil disorder, and destruction of government property.
Mr. Rehl, 35, of Philadelphia, was found guilty of the same six charges.
A mistrial was declared on two other charges in both men’s cases, and they were found not guilty on a ninth count.
Mr. Rehl’s prison term is the third longest to date among all Jan. 6 defendants.
U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly accepted the Department of Justice’s recommendation to add a terrorism enhancement to both men’s sentences—vastly increasing their potential prison time—but opted for only about half of what the DOJ was seeking for incarceration.
Mr. Biggs broke down when addressing Judge Kelly before his sentence was announced. “I know that I messed up that day. But I’m not a terrorist. I know I have to be punished, and I understand,” he said.
Mr. Rehl likewise was emotional when addressing the court, blaming himself for letting his family down and asking for leniency. “Jan. 6 was a despicable day,” he said.
Judge Kelly said the men had the right to peacefully protest and avail themselves of the legal system if they didn’t like the 2020 election results. But their rights stopped when it came to conspiring to prevent the congressional certification of the Electoral College votes, he said.
Judge Kelly said Mr. Biggs, Mr. Rehl, and the other Proud Boys were part of a “mob that brought an entire government branch to heel” on Jan. 6, 2021.
In a sentencing memo filed with the court on Aug. 17, defense attorney Norman Pattis anticipated the terrorism-enhanced sentences, although, in court, he described them as “shocking” and a “grotesque overreach” that’s designed to chill dissent.
Mr. Pattis represented both men in their criminal trials.
‘Not Terrorists’
“The defendants are not terrorists,” Mr. Pattis wrote. “Whatever excesses of zeal they demonstrated on Jan. 6, 2021, and no matter how grave the potential interference with the orderly transfer of power due to the events of that day, a decade or more behind bars is an excessive punishment.”Addressing Judge Kelly on Aug. 31, Mr. Pattis said: “The conundrum is often speech is used to explain the crime. In this case, the crime was used to explain the speech.”
He said Mr. Biggs’s destruction of a $32,000 Capitol fence shouldn’t be considered terrorism because the fence was a “means to an end,” not an attempt to influence the government.
Mr. Pattis asked Judge Kelly to, in essence, declare a “cease-fire” as Congress works to determine if the DOJ has become weaponized.
“We are a nation born in dissent; our politics has often been raw and raucous,” Mr. Pattis wrote. “The challenge in divided times is not to divide and conquer, but to build bridges between people who love this country, sometimes in shockingly different ways.”
He suggested a more appropriate way to handle these cases would have been to put them in perspective.
“We will never know what would have happened if the government had charged modest crimes for a disturbance that lasted for several hours one day in January 2021—the defendants may well have pleaded guilty to trespass, disorderly conduct, and other offenses,” Mr. Pattis wrote.
“They could well have served their time and returned home by now.”
Assistant U.S. Attorney Jason McCullough defended the government’s recommended 33-year prison sentence for Mr. Biggs.
‘A Vocal Leader’
In its sentencing memorandum for Mr. Biggs, the prosecution called him “a vocal leader and influential proponent of the group’s shift toward political violence.”“More than perhaps any other, Biggs appreciated the tactical advantage that his force had that day, and he understood the significance of his actions against his own government,” prosecutors wrote.
“Biggs understood that the outnumbered forces attempting to hold the Capitol would be powerless due to his side’s overwhelming numbers.
“Biggs’s guidelines range—after the application of the adjustment for Biggs’s crime of terrorism—rightly reflects the seriousness of his assault on our government and Biggs’s leading role in it.
“Biggs’s conduct warrants a sentence of 33 years of incarceration.”
Prosecutors said Mr. Biggs and his co-defendants felt they were leading a “second American revolution.”
“Biggs arrived at the Capitol to lead a revolution against a government that he viewed as illegitimate,” prosecutors wrote.
“Like [Enrique] Tarrio and [Ethan] Nordean, Biggs viewed himself and his movement as a second American revolution where he and the other ‘patriots’ would retake the government by force.”
Prosecutors said Mr. Biggs—perhaps more than any other defendant—“promoted the use of force against the government.”
“Beginning in the days after the election, Biggs declared that the country could face ‘civil war’ because the ‘Left’ was ‘radicalizing people by stealing [the] election,’” prosecutors wrote.
“Biggs told his followers that it was ’time for [expletive] War if they steal this [expletive].' ... Biggs steadily escalated his calls for political violence.”
Prosecutors said that Mr. Rehl repeatedly perjured himself during testimony, meriting an upward sentence enhancement for obstruction.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Erik Kenerson said Mr. Rehl denied assaulting police with a chemical irritant “no less than 15 times.”
He said Mr. Rehl helped lead a “historic attack on American democracy” on Jan. 6, 2021.
Former Proud Boys national chairman Henry “Enrique” Tarrio had been scheduled for sentencing on Aug. 30, but his hearing was moved to Sept. 5 because Judge Kelly had become ill. Prosecutors are seeking 33 years in prison for Mr. Tarrio.
The sentencing of Proud Boys defendant Ethan Nordean was moved to Sept. 1 in Judge Kelly’s courtroom, along with defendant Dominic Pezzola.
Prosecutors in those cases are seeking 27 years and 20 years in prison, respectively.
